Course Sampling

Areas of Expertise

U.S. taxation

Biography

Valrie Chambers, Ph.D., CPA is an associate professor of accounting at Stetson University. Chambers worked for a private corporation and then founded her own CPA business, which she ran for over a decade before returning to school to obtain a Ph.D. from the University of Houston. Prior to coming to Stetson in 2014, she received the Texas Society of CPAs Outstanding Accounting Educator Award in 2012 and the Bobby Bizzell Southwestern Deans' 2006 Innovative Achievement Award, won the Texas A&M System Student Recognition Award for Teaching Excellence multiple times, won multiple awards for her service activities, published peer-reviewed articles extensively in journals, including the Journal of Economic Psychology, Tax Notes and The Tax Adviser and had her work cited by two different federal courts and in a report by the National Taxpayer Advocate of the IRS.

“Labor Supply and Productivity Responses to Family-Friendly Policies: Dependent Tuition Reductions, Do They Work? If So, at What Level Do They Work Best?” With Deniz Gevrek, Marilyn Spencer and Randall Bowden, Personnel Review, July (3rd Quarter/Summer) 2015

"Modernizing the Theft Loss Deduction for Victims of Securities Frauds and Ponzi Schemes." With Brian Elzweig, Banking & Financial Services Policy Report, September 2011, 30(6)F: 1-11. Impact: Federal judge Francis Allegra of the United States Court of Federal Claims cited an article written by Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi professors Brian Elzweig and Valrie Chambers entitled "Modernizing the Theft Loss Deduction for Victims of Securities Frauds and Ponzi Schemes" (30 No. 9 Banking and Financial Services Policy Report 1 (Sept. 2011). In Goeller v. United States (--Fed.Cl. --, 2013 WL 1143321 (Fed.Cl.), 111 A.F.T.R.2d 2013-1255, 2013-1 USTC P 50,238), Judge Francis cited the study for noting the anomaly that in order to claim a theft loss deduction on ones taxes, the "theft" must meet the definition of theft in the state law in which the alleged theft occurred. A theft violation of federal law that does not meet the definition theft under the state in which it occurred would not lead to the availability of the theft loss. Judge Francis cited the paper stating "Can it be that when a conviction for theft is obtained under Federal statutes, a taxpayer harmed by that conduct must still gauge the deductibility of his losses by hypothetically applying a state criminal law? Of course not. None of this, indeed, makes the least bit sense." This could lead to a major change in Federal law based in part on the research by Elzweig and Chambers.

"Securities Fraud and the Tax Loss Deduction: The Rise and (Perhaps) Fall of the Stockbroker Exclusion." With Brian Elzweig, Journal of Legal Studies in Business, 16 (2010): 20-44.

(Lead) "The Best of Both Worlds: Do Below Market Leases or Sales After Eminent Domain Create a Taxable Accession to Wealth?" With Brian Elzweig, Journal of Legal, Ethical and Regulatory Issues, 2009, 13 (1): 1-15.

(Lead) "Does Changing the Timing of a Yearly Individual Tax Refund Change the Amount Spent Vs. Saved?" With Marilyn Spencer, Journal of Economic Psychology, 2008, 29: 856-862; available online at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.joep.2008.04.001. Impact factor: 1.081. Impact: Cited 18 times as of December 1, 2013 per Google Scholar. Included in these citations is a citation in "A Smarter Stimulus" by James Surowiecki in The New Yorker (January 26, 2009). Authors from The Congressional Budget Office, Harvard and UC Berkeley also cited this work. This article says, in essence, that with respect to stimulating the economy, a tax rebate in a lump sum of $600 does not, behaviorally speaking, have the same effect as a series of smaller, periodic tax rebates totaling the same amount (e.g. 12 monthly rebates of $50). This article (as subsequently cited) led to a change in the distribution of the 2009 tax rebate from a lump sum rebate to the Making Work Pay tax cuts which reduced federal withholdings over several pay periods. Michael Grunwald (The New Deal, Simon and Schuster, 2010) explained it on p. 126: Studies in "behavioral economics" have shown that we're more likely to save money when it arrives in a big chunk. When we receive the same windfall without noticing it, we're more likely to spend it without thinking. So Summers and ther rest of the economic team argued for leaking out the tax cuts without fanfare, to mainline more cash into the economic bloodstream.

(Lead/Interdisciplinary) "Reactions to the 2008 Economic Crisis and the Theory of Planned Behavior." With Bilaye Benibo and Marilyn Spencer, Academy of Accounting and Financial Studies Journal, December 2011, 15(4): 17-30.

(Lead) "The Federal Government Vs. York County: A Transfer Pricing Case for Managerial Accounting Students." With Dean DiGregorio, and Abby Royce.Journal of the International Academy for Case Studies, 2008, 14 (1): 119-122 and 14 (2): 131-136.